I must be the only author on the Internet who forgets to remind you when he has stuff out you can buy. Not long ago, I wrote a four-issue mini-series of Rocky & Bullwinkle for IDW. It was expertly drawn by Roger Langridge and the four issues have now been collected into a nifty paperback. If you're fond of the old Jay Ward cartoons and want to read a comic book adaptation by guys who are just as fond of those shows are you are, this is the book for you. It can be ordered from Amazon here.

Also on sale now is the second issue of the long-awaited (and I mean long) mini-series of Groo Vs. Conan. I'm not sure what I did in this series but I did something and I seem to be a character in it, along with my partner Sergio Aragonés, the world's greatest barbarian hero and the world's stupidest barbarian hero. Pick one up wherever you buy comic books…and if they don't carry it, insult the owner to his face, walk out of his shop and never go in there again.

I have more things coming out which I'll probably forget to plug here because I'm too busy getting you to go see Frank Ferrante.

Here's a clip of Fred "Mickey" Finn, who has had a remarkable career. I'll tell you just about everything I know about it and I may have some of this wrong…

Fred and his wife Mickie ran a very successful nightclub in San Diego in the sixties. He played piano and fronted a jazzy, energetic Dixieland band. She played the banjo. People packed Mickie Finn's, as the club was called, drinking beer and singing along with the very loud music. It was so popular that in 1966, NBC put on a series called Mickie Finn's, which was just them and their band playing jazzy tunes for a half-hour. I remember watching and thinking that it was just about impossible to feel depressed or listless listening to them play. I was disappointed when it was replaced by a sitcom that didn't do as well.

In the early seventies, the club in San Diego closed and around that time, Fred and Mickie got a divorce. I'm a little fuzzy on the timing but I think at that point, Fred began billing himself as Mickie Finn or sometimes Mickey Finn or Fred "Mickey" Finn. He married again — to another woman who looked somewhat like his first wife and could also play the banjo — and the act went on, headlining for years in Las Vegas and later touring.

I saw them in Laughlin, Nevada in the mid-eighties and if you'd been in Arizona at the time and opened a window, you probably heard them there. They were real good but real loud…and again, so lively and happy they could have put a smile on Buster Keaton, even in his present condition. After the show, I tried to go over and meet Fred (or Mickey or whatever his name was that week) but a neckless casino guard wouldn't let me anywhere near the performers.

I believe The Mickey Finn Show still tours now and then, probably in venues I will never visit. Aside from the decibel level and the part where Mr. Finn asks everyone in the audience to pinch, tickle or hug the person sitting next to them, I'd love to see him again. The guy was (and I presume still is) a really fine player of the piano and a showman extraordinaire. Here's a little of what he did or does…

As my weight has gone up and down over the years, I occasionally have to abandon an entire wardrobe as Too Small or Too Big. When it's Too Small, I don't usually give them all away. I go through and pick out the items I like least and then my former cleaning lady joyously ships them off to El Salvador, which is where she is from. At this moment, entire families are living in pants I wore before Gastric Bypass Surgery.

I put the items I like best into storage, optimistically believing I will one day be the right size for them again. Since the operation in 2006, I have again donned many of those items. I have even watched them go from being The Right Size to Too Big.

The other day, I once again decided it was time to stop wearing trousers that were a little too big on me and switch to trousers that will be for a time, a little too small on me. So El Salvador gets my old jeans and the former cleaning lady is very happy. I sometimes feel I'm losing the weight just for her.

When I was gaining and going from size to size, I sometimes didn't realize what was happening. This is because of something I call The Creeping Trouser Self-Deception. Here is how it works…

You go in to buy new pants and you tell the sales clerk, "I have a 36 waist." He fetches samples and you try 'em on. The Levis and Dockers fit fine but the Haggar slacks are a little snug.

"The Haggars run a little small," the clerk tells you as he hauls out a pair of them in 38. You try them on and they fit exactly like the size 36 Dockers you just selected. Okay, fine. You take them all home, not pausing to wonder if maybe you've put on a few pounds around the mid-section. After all, you're still wearing a 36.

But what you forget is that you're also wearing a 38. And next time you go in for jeans, you're buying Levis that size, and the time after, the Wrangler jeans seem tight in 36 so the clerk suggests a 38…

…and up and up you go.

Further complicating all this are pants with elastic waistbands which allow you to think you're wearing a 36 when it's really being stretched to a 40. I used to have a pair of jeans that had that plus they were made out of some sort of stretchy material…and no matter how large I got, they fit. It's hard to take your weight gain seriously when you're wearing the same pants you were wearing two years ago.

I don't know where those pants are now. It wouldn't surprise me if Cirque Du Soleil is staging a show inside them at this very moment. Next time I go to one of their tents, I'm going to see if we enter through a zipper in the front.

So here's what happened at the Comedy Store this evening. A lot of Larry Storch fans packed the place. The evening's producer Matt Beckoff and emcee Wally Wingert brought out a bunch of Larry's friends and admirers — comedienne Helen Hong, Hank Garrett (who appeared with Larry on Car 54, Where Are You?), Marion Ross (from Happy Days), Bob Burns (who co-starred with Larry on the live-action Saturday morn series, The Ghost Busters), Peter Marshall (from The Hollywood Squares), Ted Lange and Bernie Kopell (from Love Boat) and Ken Berry and Jackie Joseph (who appeared with Larry on F Troop).

Fine, good, fun. Some very funny stories were told.

Then came Larry, who at age 91 is still able to stand on a stage and make the audience laugh a lot. He didn't have to be that funny. The people in the house loved him and would have been happy just to see him walk erect. But as it turns out, he was very funny. He told a couple of jokes that I fully intend to steal and put to my own use…not that I'll be able to tell them as well as he did. He looked like he was having a very good time, too.

The audience arrived adoring Larry and left adoring him even more. There were some great anecdotes about his long, wonderful career. Here's something I didn't know: Ken Berry told how he was cast first in F Troop, then brought in to read in auditions of actors for the role of Sgt. O'Rourke. At this point, the role of Agarn did not exist in the script. Storch came in to read for O'Rourke and Berry was thrilled at the prospect of working with such a fine comic actor.

Then Forrest Tucker read for O'Rourke and it was obvious to all he was perfect in the part. Berry thought, "Well, there goes my chance to work with Larry Storch" but as it turns out, the producers were so impressed with Larry's audition for the wrong role, they decided to add the right role to the script. That was how Ken Berry got to work with Larry Storch. For our sake, I'm glad he did.

Your Friendly Neighborhood Blogger is dealing with a computer crash and a telephone outage at the moment so Guess What. That's right: Not much blogging here today. Regular posting will resume tomorrow.

One of the things I'll be telling you about then is what I'm doing tonight. Many years ago, in a Sunset Strip nightclub called Ciro's, a brilliant comedian named Larry Storch made his Los Angeles debut. Now, Ciro's is the big room at the Comedy Store and tonight, Larry Storch (age 91) is making his farewell (to L.A.) appearance in the same room. Gotta be there.

(And by the way: If you want to be there, I'm hearing there are still tickets left.)

Here's an article about Larry and his appearance tonight. You will also note that among those appearing with Larry this evening is his old co-star from Car 54, Where Are You?, Hank Garrett. Hank is an amazing actor — a former wrestler who could still probably get in the ring and pin anyone reading this. I've worked with Hank a number of times — he's done voices for Garfield and other cartoon shows among the many things he does — and he's a very funny, talented man who's been in dozens of movies. People seem to remember him for a showy dramatic role in Three Days of the Condor but I like to point out that he had one line in The Producers.

I mention Hank because it fascinates me that everyone in my life intersects with everyone else in my life. I meet someone from one walk of life and find they have a connection to someone from another walk of life. I've known Hank for years and he used to be a neighbor of mine. One day when he was here, he saw all the comic books around and said, "Hey, when I was in high school, my best friend was a guy who became a comic book artist. Maybe you've heard of him."

I had. It was our good friend Stan Goldberg.

I have to get back to data recovery and waiting for the phone guy. Back later…eventually…I hope…

Fred Kaplan on President Obama's plans to deal with ISIS. I find myself unable to get too interested in all this…not that it's not important but I keep thinking this: It's one of those problems we can't ignore but nothing we do is going to make much difference.

In the previous message, I said I wrote a pilot for Tom Dreesen in the "early eighties" that would have had Leonard Barr in it. Mark Thorson, one of the readers of this site who keeps me honest, points out to me that Mr. Barr died November 22, 1980. I went and looked up the pilot script in question and I see that it's dated July 12, 1979. That was an interesting experience and one of these days, I'll write a long post about what happened.

I always liked Leonard Barr, a veteran vaudeville comic who got a lot of attention because he was Dean Martin's uncle. I thought he deserved a lot of attention because he was funny. This clip shows you his deadpan delivery but does not, alas, close the way he closed most of his stand-up performances…with a funny, eccentric dance.

In the early eighties, I wrote a sitcom pilot for CBS that was to star comedian Tom Dreesen. The whole thing was a real roller coaster experience: One day they liked it, the next day they didn't and so on. They ultimately decided against taping it but through the process, the one element of it that everyone at the network loved was a casting idea of Tom's. One of the characters was a crotchety old man who is hated by everyone on the series and in the neighborhood where it took place. I had imagined Charles Lane in the role but Tom suggested Leonard Barr…and from that moment on, that's who it had to be.

I'm sorry the show never got made. It would have been fun watching Mr. Barr steal it. Here he is in a badly-edited clip…

CBS head guy Les Moonves says that overnight ratings are "virtually irrelevant" now. His argument makes total sense but I'll bet there isn't a producer or network exec who doesn't walk into work each morning and ask, "How'd we do in the overnights?"

George Packer on the Fall of Saigon. Henry Kissinger is the guest on The Colbert Report tonight and I have the feeling Stephen will not be asking him about any of this.

We've been on and offline a few times this morning for techy reasons. Things will all become stable here soon.

I'm in one of my periodic spells of not paying a whole lot of attention to the news so that's why I'm not writing about ISIS, Ebola, Ray Rice or the new iPhones. As a general rule of thumb, I'm opposed to killing people, hitting people or larger smartphones.

The Warner Archive Collection is bringing out a complete DVD set of Loopy DeLoop cartoons. As I wrote here, I'm a huge fan of the Hanna-Barbera cartoons produced in the studio's early days…with the exception of this series. Loopy's cartoons were done for theatrical exhibition and when I heard about them, I felt deprived. I loved the H-B cartoons on TV…and here they were doing a series that I couldn't see on Channel 11! When I finally did manage to lay eyes on a couple, I couldn't believe that the same folks making those great Yogi Bear and Quick Draw McGraw cartoons were responsible for these.

H-B did some very poor cartoons later on but those didn't have good writers and good animators and Daws Butler doing the lead voice. These did so they somehow bothered me more.

I should have mentioned that along with A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum coming out on Blu-ray yesterday, so did The Great Race, which I think is a better movie. I wrote about that film here. You can order a copy here. Again, there do not seem to be any extras on the disc.

By the way: Over the years, a number of folks have written to me to complain that I was typing "Blu-Ray" instead of "Blu-ray." This never seemed significant enough for me to take the time to change it but a couple of recent messages convinced me. So I've changed it everywhere it has appeared on this site. I refuse though to, as many have demanded, remove the hyphen from "e-mail."

Today is the release date for the new Blu-ray edition of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, the 1966 film adaptation of the musical written by Burt Shevelove, Larry Gelbart and Stephen Sondheim. If you don't have time to read this whole review of the movie, I can give you a quick summary…

• If you never saw a good production of the stage play, you'll probably love it. It has Zero Mostel, Jack Gilford, Phil Silvers, Buster Keaton and other talented people. It has low comedy and lots of sexy women wearing very little clothing. It has action and broad comedy and a frenetic pace.
• If you have seen a good production of the stage play, you'll probably dislike it. Zero Mostel, Jack Gilford, Burt Shevelove, Larry Gelbart and Stephen Sondheim certainly did. Mr. Gelbart described his first viewing thusly: "It was like being run over by a truck that stopped and backed up so it could run over you again." Phil Silvers thought it was a good film but not as good as it would have been if they'd followed the play more closely. Mr. Keaton died before this, his final film was released so we can only guess what he would have thought of it…though given that he'd just come off Beach Blanket Bingo and How to Stuff a Wild Bikini, he probably would still have regarded it as a step up.

So what do some of us think is wrong with it? Well, it's not the casting…though some problems were created by putting Phil Silvers in the role of Lycus. That's a small role in the original play and Silvers was at the time, probably the biggest star in the movie. He was especially big in the international market so his part had to be enlarged. That's not as easy as it sounds.

The plot of Forum is like a Rubik's Cube. You move one piece and everything else moves with it. I've seen some productions where they tried to hack it down by a half-hour or so and that's not easy. Something in one scene affects something in another. When they expanded the role of Lycus (somewhat pointlessly in a story sense) and added a big, pointless chariot race at the end, a lot of other stuff had to be cut. Among the cuts were quite a few of Stephen Sondheim's songs.

So one problem is that they took the storyline — this wonderful, intricate farce — and chopped out an awful lot of it and rejuggled what was left to try and have it still make sense. It does…but the stage version made more sense and was funnier. Another problem is that…well, any time you're throwing away Sondheim tunes, something is wrong.

Mostel complained about Too Much Spectacle. On the stage, it was a simple production with a complex plot. On stage, it was one set and pretty much one set of costumes. He thought too much of the comedy got lost in the movie by trying to re-create Ancient Rome with gladiators and chariots and lavish sets and big crowd scenes.

My complaints mostly have to do with the plot reconfigurations, the jettisoned songs and — most of all — the editing. Director Richard Lester had a unique style of constructing jokes via the editing — something that was considered a modern, hip approach at the time. I question whether a very classic, old-style comedy combining Roman farce and 1930's burlesque set in an ancient era was best served by a modern, hip approach. To me, it makes the film one continual, distracting anachronism.

Worse, it cedes control of the comedy from the comedians to the editor. The timing on the screen is not that of Zero Mostel, Phil Silvers, Jack Gilford, Buster Keaton and a fine comic actor named Michael Hordern (and a young, just-starting-out juvenile named Michael Crawford). It's the timing of Richard Lester, reconstructing their performances (and rewriting the Shevelove-Gelbart dialogue) by cutting between lines and words and forever calling more attention to the cutting than to what the actors are saying. In a way, it reminds me of what Russ Meyer did on some of his films, casting untalented actors because of their physical appearance, then creating their performances in the editing room with cutting tricks. Lester did not have untalented actors whose delivery needed tricks.

So do I dislike this movie? I'm in Group 2 above…but still, there are moments. I can sometimes put myself in the frame of mind of Group 1 and forget about what the movie should have been and enjoy some of it for what it is. Mostel, Silvers, Gilford and Keaton are four of the most gifted comic actors who ever lived and it's hard to resist a movie with them in it…so I'm ordering the Blu-ray. You can, too.

It apparently has no special features but the box does display the little-seen Jack Davis poster art. Like so many comedy movies of the era, someone hired Jack and asked for something like It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and he delivered. He always did.

Here's a triple feature for you. Here's a clip with Cookie Monster visiting John Oliver's show…

And here we have the two of them doing a Special Report on words…

And after you watch that, you might want to watch some outtakes…

Forty years ago today, President Gerald R. Ford granted "a full, free, and absolute pardon unto Richard Nixon for all offenses against the United States which he, Richard Nixon, committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 20 through August 9, 1974." Ford said it was for the good of the country; that the nation had to put the Watergate scandals behind it. Others suggested Ford was trying to save the Republican Party further damage and to spare himself an awkward situation. It would have been tougher to issue a pardon and shut things down if the investigation went forward, more Nixon wrongdoing was unearthed and actual criminal charges were being readied.

Rick Perlstein believes that regardless of his motives, what Ford achieved was to end presidential accountability in this country. The impeachment of Bill Clinton looks even more ludicrous and partisan when you look at what Reagan and both Bushes got away with.

CBS has finally made it official: British comic actor James Corden will replace Craig Ferguson as host of The Late, Late Show. This was reported several weeks ago on some websites but it's not real until it's formally announced and Bill Carter reports it. Betcha the delay was because it wasn't firm and contracts were still being hammered out.

As I'm not familiar with Mr. Corden, I have no opinion on the selection. I would guess though that the deciders at CBS had to be really impressed with the guy. They had loads of applicants and some pressure to not pick a white guy. Still, they decided this white guy was their guy.

We still have no firm announcement of when Mr. Letterman will do his last show and what he'll do after that. I'm hearing the end of May is likely and that when the network announces that, they'd like to be able to also announce a continuing relationship with David Letterman to remain as part of the CBS family. Just what he'd do is a good question.